Lights, camera, action

In the age of digital cameras, or even mobile cameras, the heavy cameras used by pioneers of Indian cinema seem totally out of place.

TNN | Nov 19, 2012, 06.43 AM IST

In the age of digital cameras, or even mobile cameras, the heavy cameras used by pioneers of Indian cinema seem totally out of place. Yet three cameras seen at Nandan during the just concluded film festival drew the attention of hundreds, thousands. One was used for mere decoration of the grounds where food stalls competed with book stalls. Another was part of the exhibition mounted by NFDC to mark Cinema 100. This one was a 35mm Mitchell used by Subrata Mitra for the landmark debut of Satyajit Ray. The third was the property of Anjan Bose of Arora Films who brought it with him, displayed it with love, and carefully folded it back into its case at the end of the evening.

This camera was a Bell and Howell used by Hiralal Sen. It must have cost him a fortune in those years. He had bought it with money borrowed from his mother. When he had cancer, he pawned the camera to raise money for his treatment. When he came to know this, Adinath Bose, founder of Aurora Corporation and grandfather of Anjan Bose, had redeemed it and returned it to Hiralal Sen.

Zooming into limelight Love for cinema, too, comes in many shapes.

Hiralal Sen's name has zoomed into limelight with the 18th KFF. Few people knew about the eminent role he played in the infant years of Indian cinema that's now 100. With short films on coconut oils, among others, he was our first ad filmmaker. With his 1905 film on Bengal Partition, he can be called the first documentary maker of substance. And with the feature film Alibaba and Forty Thieves - made in 1903 - one full decade before Raja Harishchandra - he could be the father of Indian Cinema!

But little is known about the man who died of cancer, prematurely at age 51 in 1917 - the year all his work perished in a tragic fire. An adda at the tent-theatre named after him brought to light that years ago one Kalish Mukherjee wrote a book of which hardly any copy is available. Hiralal's daughter had no photograph of him, only some taken by him. So it's refreshing to know that Tapan Ray Chowdhury, eminent historian and author of Bangalnama, is a grand nephew of the pioneer.

The Cinema 100 celebration also brought to public knowledge that Pramathesh Barua's son, Deb Kumar, continues to reside in this city, on the road named after his father.

Happy b'day Metro

Metro Railway's 28th birthday celebrations on Sunday turned into a treat for 116 street children. The children, accompanied by Metro general manager Radhe Shyam and volunteers from Save the Children, took a ride in an air-conditioned rake between Kavi Subhas and Dum Dum in the afternoon. "November 14 was Children's Day and Save the Children is observing International Child Rights Week. We got two bands - Pratishruti and X-RaF (Raga and Folk) to perform for the children at Kavi Subhas station. We also got two painters to interact with the children. One of them, Mithun Roy, had brought sketches and helped the children fill them up with colours," said Protyush Ghosh, DGM(G), Metro Railway. Shyam's wife Vinay Kumari Devi presented the children with painting kits on behalf of the Metro Railway Wives' Welfare Organisation, of which she is the president.

In search of the self

Recently, poet Shankha Ghosh inaugurated the literary magazine Udaar Akash's special issue Atamaparichayer Anneshan (In Quest Of Self Identity). The magazine which already received critical acclaim for compiling some of the finest essays of this time on contemporary issues, has dealt with identity of the Bengali and Bengal at a time when the world is on the threshold of shift or a change.

"The Bengali and its literature are also at the same crossroad at a time when there is no Sunil Gangopadhyay or Syed Mustafa Siraj. As an editorof a literary magazine, I feel responsible to take the tradition forward with nurturing of newer literary talents," said Faruq Ahmed, the editor of Udar Akash who dedicated the magazine to Syed Mustafa Siraj. Ghosh appreciated the effort and the magazine's penchant for quality writings. The writers include some of the finest literary luminaries like Sunil Gagopadhyay, Niren Chakraborty, Abdur Rab Khan, Mustafa Al Mamoon, Wailur Rehman, Sajal Ahmed.

The city witnessed a rare evening on Saturday at the concluding party of Kolkata Film Festival. A cultural program was organized at a city hotel in east Kolkata by one of the sponsors of the event Universal Success where film festival delegates along with Tollywood stars were present. Chief minister Mamata Banerjee came at around 7.45 PM and for a change she was just a listener of old Bengali melody performed by Indranil Sen. Banerjee was there for an hour but has not spoken anything for the audience rather she was glued to the old songs. Inspired by the presence of Mamata Banerjee, Indranil sang for almost 2 hours non stop, all the hits of Hemanta Mukherjee, Sandhya Mukherjee, Geeta Dutta, Manna Dey and others from Golden Era of Bengali film songs. It is only after Banerjee left the venue, Indranil performed some popular Hindi number from sixties and seventies.

Bookworms' delight

Bangladesh is the theme country of next year's Kolkata International Book Fair and this has generated a lot of enthusiasm among Bengali literature enthusiasts. here because they will get to see a lot of Bengali publications from the country at the fair.

Though readers want to read the works of authors from Bangladesh, very few are available in the book market here because of restricted trade in books between the two countries. Interestingly, books by authors from West Bengal have a large readership in Bangladesh and are readily available there, though most of them are pirated. The issue will be addressed at the fair and This has been a bone of contention among both authors and publishers here. A large number of seminars will be held during the fair to find solutions to such problems one only hopes that readers on the two sides stand to benefit.

Metro gifts a smile to kids

Metro Railway's 28th birthday celebrations on Sunday turned into a treat for 116 street children. The children, accompanied by Metro general manager Radhe Shyam and volunteers from Save the Children, took a ride in an air-conditioned rake between Kavi Subhas and Dum Dum in the afternoon. "November 14 was Children's Day and Save the Children is observing International Child Rights Week. We got two bands - Pratishruti and X-RaF (Raga and Folk) to perform for the children at Kavi Subhas station. We also got two painters to interact with the children. One of them, Mithun Roy, had brought sketches and helped the children fill them up with colours," said Protyush Ghosh, DGM(G), Metro Railway. Shyam's wife Vinay Kumari Devi presented the children with painting kits on behalf of the Metro Railway Wives' Welfare Organisation, of which she is the president.

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